Mériem Rabhi
"Every art is political."
Mériem's art is born in the streets, in the city, outside, in the nature. She walks out, paces, ambles, travels, wanders, crosses, feels, considers, pays attention, looks for distraction... still, she strolls without expectation. She doesn't dispose herself to take pictures, to be receptive to photography is a specific kind of readiness.
In a foreign place, in a unknown city, Mériem discovers and strives to make her environment more familiar. One does not live in a place e barely discovers, e is curious, on watch, e dreads, e watches out for any kind of landmark...
By taking pictures of her environment, Mériem both takes her place and creates a distance. She reifies it, carves it, cuts it to better take it with her. She aestheticizes it, without fuss, she simply shows what is beautiful, there. This beauty is both frank and refined.
Diagonale (Diagonal) © Mériem Rabhi (2016).
Her photographs are no simple pictures. Of course, the eye is attracted by a fortunate combination of lines and colours, by the objects encountered, by the surprise. These are as many opportunities she seizes. But what strikes her sight is human, the photographs show the traces of eir activity, the way e takes up place, the way it inhabits eir environment, how e shelters.
Mériem is a complex artist, who let contradictions in. She is a vivid reflection, which takes shape, anyway. None of her images are innocent.
Abribus (Bus shelter) © Mériem Rabhi (2016).
To find a shelter, to sit on the sand in autumn
Mériem's exhibition at the 188 is the result of a close collaboration, which, hopefully, only starts...
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